Networks are commonly designed with protection switching capabilities. The protection switching mechanism is standardized (e.g. ITU-T G.8032). The active links are monitored and when a link fails the node sends a signal failed (SF) message and the traffic is routed to an alternative link. Another approach to trigger protection switching is to periodically send continuity checks (CC) messages consecutively on the active link. The node at the other end monitors the reception of the CC messages and if more than a predetermined number of consecutive CC messages are not received the link is deemed to have failed and protection switching is triggered so the traffic is routed to the alternate link. In the current standards, protection switching is only triggered when a link has failed.